Warmaster (1993) Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Rules Overview
• Preparing the Board and Counters
• Deployment
• How to Win
• Sequence of Play
• Reinforcements
  • Teleport Table
  • Reinforcement List
• Movement
• Stacking
• Combat Phases
  • Transcriber's note: Combat Results Table
• Destroyed Units
• Retreats
• Face-Down Units
• Rerolling Dice
  • Transcriber's note: Special Rules
• Designer's Notes
• Strategy: Traitor Player
• Strategy: Imperial Player

Rules Overview

Before starting, it is strongly recommended that you read all of the rules at least once to get a general idea of how the game works. The rules are not complicated; reading them will not take long. Make sure you also read the special rules carefully. They are very important!

Preparing the Board and Counters

You will need to separate the board and the counters from your copy of White Dwarf to play Warmaster. Cut out the counters carefully and as exactly as possible: each counter is important to the game, and the counters must not be distinguishable from one another when placed face down.

The game board shows a top view of the Warmaster cruiser, Horus's battle-cruiser in orbit around Terra. The board is divided into areas (squares) of different sizes, used to regulate the movement and position of the units. Each combat unit counter has a name and a symbol printed on it that identify the unit represented, as well as two numbers printed on its lower part. These numbers represent the unit's attack and defence factors. The higher these numbers, the more deadly the unit is in combat!

Deployment

Place the game board on any flat surface. One player controls the Imperial forces and the other controls the Traitor forces.

The Traitor player deploys his units on the board first. The Imperial player must turn around or leave the room so that he cannot see where the Traitor units are deployed, so that he has no unfair advantage.

The units that make up the Traitor army at the start of the game have a black reverse and bear the white Eye of Horus at their centre. Take these counters and place them on the map, one unit per area. Units are placed on the map face down, so the Imperial player does not know which unit is in each area. They are only turned over when the Imperial player moves a unit into that area, to discover what is waiting for him!

The remaining Traitor counters (which have a grey reverse with a white skull) are placed in a cup or similar opaque container. These are reinforcements, which will be drawn at random from the cup as the game progresses.

Once the Traitor player has deployed all of his units, the Imperial player prepares his forces. The three Imperial Guard counters are set aside for the moment. The remaining 12 counters are arranged into four groups of three counters each. The Imperial player decides which counters go into each group; as long as there are four groups of three counters at the end, he may form the groups as he wishes. These groups of units are the Imperial main assault forces and will be teleported aboard Horus's ship during the first turn of play.

How to Win

The Traitor player wins if he kills the Emperor. The Imperial player wins by killing Horus. The game ends immediately at the moment the Emperor or Horus is killed. If both die at exactly the same time, the game ends in a draw.

Sequence of Play

A game of Warmaster is played in turns, each of which is made up of six phases. In each phase certain actions may be carried out. Each action must be carried out in the appropriate phase, and a new phase may not begin until the previous one has been completed in full. The actions that may be carried out in each phase are listed in the following sequence of play and described in the rules that follow.

1. IMPERIAL REINFORCEMENT PHASE: The Imperial player may teleport the appropriate reinforcement groups aboard the ship.
2. IMPERIAL MOVEMENT PHASE: The Imperial player may move all Imperial units that are aboard the ship.
3. IMPERIAL COMBAT PHASE: Any combat provoked by the movement of the Imperial units is resolved.
4. TRAITOR REINFORCEMENT PHASE: The Traitor player rolls a die to see how many reinforcement units he receives this turn, draws that number of units from the cup and teleports them aboard the ship.
5. TRAITOR MOVEMENT PHASE: The Traitor player may move any of the counters aboard the ship that are face up.
6. TRAITOR COMBAT PHASE: Any combat provoked by the movement of the Traitor player is resolved.

Reinforcements

During the Reinforcement Phase, reinforcement units may be teleported aboard the ship. The number of units that can be teleported aboard the ship varies depending on whether you are the Imperial or the Traitor player, and is shown in the Reinforcement List below. To teleport units aboard the ship, you must make a special 1D66 roll for each group or each unit being teleported, and consult the Teleport Table.

Making this roll is not as complicated as it seems, since you only need two normal six-sided dice. Simply roll the dice one after the other, and count the first result as the tens and the second as the units. Combine the two results to obtain the final score. For example, if your first die is a 5 and your second die is a 3, the result is 53; if the first die is a 1 and the second die is a 6, the result is 16.

Teleport Table

D66	Result
11	Disaster! A terrifying accident during the teleport destroys the units.
12-13	Failure! The teleport is delayed. The units may attempt to teleport during the next teleport phase of their owner.
14-56	Success! The counters are placed in a random area of the ship. Each area of the ship is numbered. Place the units in the area with the same number as the result obtained with the dice.
61-66	Perfect! You may choose the area to which you wish to teleport the units. The units may be placed in any part of the ship except the reactor areas.

Reinforcement List

Imperial player, Turn One: The Imperial player must teleport the four groups of units prepared before the start of the game during this turn. The first group that must be teleported is the one that includes the Emperor. Units are teleported as a group; all units in the same group are teleported to the same area. Do not roll a die for each of the units.

Imperial player, Turn Two: During the second turn of the game, the Imperial player must teleport the three Imperial Guard units aboard the ship. Each of the Imperial Guard units is teleported separately; they are not teleported as a group.

Traitor player, Every Turn: At the start of each Traitor Reinforcement Phase, the Traitor player must roll 1D6 to determine how many units he receives as reinforcements: 1-2 = one unit, 3-4 = two units, 5-6 = three units. He must draw the units at random from the cup in which they were placed at the start of the game. Each Traitor unit is teleported aboard the ship separately; they are not teleported as a group.

Movement

During the Movement Phase, each player may move all or some of his units. A player may move as many of his units as he wishes: all of them, some of them or none of them. The total number of areas a unit may move depends on whether the player who owns the unit controls the ship's Bridge. This represents the ability of the side that controls the Bridge to open or close hatches, facilitating the movement of its own troops and hindering those of the enemy.

At the start of the game, the Traitor player controls the Bridge. From then on, the player who has a unit face up on the Bridge is the one who controls it. A counter is provided with "Imperial Control" on one side and "Traitor Control" on the other. This counter must be placed on the Bridge to show who is controlling it. If the Bridge is destroyed, neither side can control it and both are limited to moving one area per turn.

When a player controls the Bridge, his units may move up to three areas per turn. Units of the opposing player that do not control the Bridge may only move one area per turn.

A unit may move in any direction or combination of directions, as long as it does not enter a Destroyed Area. If a unit enters an area occupied by an enemy unit of any kind (including units that are face down), the unit must end its movement there and fight the enemy unit or units in the next Combat Phase.

Units are moved one at a time, and the movement of one unit must be completed before the movement of the next unit is begun. Once the movement of another unit has been started, the movement made by an earlier unit can no longer be changed, no matter how much you may want to!

Units teleported aboard the ship during the Reinforcement Phase may move normally, even if they were teleported into an area containing enemy units. However, they must end their movement as soon as they enter a new area that contains enemy units.

Stacking

The maximum number of units a player may have in one area at any one time is three units. This is called the stacking limit: the maximum number of units that may occupy a given area.

The stacking limit applies only at the end of the Movement Phase. So, while units are being teleported aboard the ship or while units are moving, the limit may be ignored. In other words, it is possible to move a unit through an area in which three other units already stand without violating the stacking limit, and it would also be allowed to move a unit into an area in which three other units already stand and then move one of those units out of the area.

However, if a Movement Phase ends and there are more than three units in an area, enough units in that area must immediately be removed from the game to bring the area within the legal stacking limit.

The stacking limit applies independently to each side, so it is possible for both players to have up to three units each in the same area.

Combat Phases

During the Combat Phase, the units of the player whose turn is in progress must attack any enemy unit located in the same area as them. All units present in each area must attack all enemy units in that same area, if there are any. The player whose turn is in progress may decide the order in which these attacks are carried out, but he must completely resolve each combat before beginning to resolve the next one.

Attacks are resolved using the Combat Results Table, which is found in the Reference Guide. To resolve each attack, the following five steps must be carried out:

1. The attacker adds up the attack values of his units.
2. The defender adds up the defence values of his units.
3. The two values are compared to obtain a combat ratio, by dividing the attacker's value by the defender's value and rounding down. This ratio determines the column of the Combat Results Table to be used. For example, if the attacker's value is 10 and the defender's value is 5, the ratio is 2 to 1 (10 divided by 5 = 2). If the attacker has a total of 9 and the defender a total of 5, the combat ratio is obtained by dividing 9 by 5. The result of this division is a little over 1, which is rounded down to give a final combat ratio of 1 to 1.
4. The attacker rolls 1D6 and locates the result in the column corresponding to the combat ratio, to determine the outcome of the combat.
5. Locate the result on the Combat Results Table and follow the instructions given.

Transcriber's note: Combat Results Table

The Combat Results Table is in the Reference Guide, which is not present in the source text. The outcomes it lists (destroyed units, retreats and any other results) are therefore not transcribed. Rules elsewhere refer to these outcomes by the terms "destroyed" and "retreat", which are defined in the sections below.

Destroyed Units

In various parts of these rules, but especially in the Combat Results Table, it is stated that one or more units have been destroyed. Destroyed units are permanently removed from the game. Where it may be chosen which units are destroyed, the Imperial player decides which Imperial units are destroyed and the Traitor player decides which Traitor units are destroyed.

Retreats

Some results on the Combat Results Table indicate that units of one of the players must retreat. Retreating units must immediately move to another area chosen by the other player (in other words, the Imperial player chooses the retreat area for Traitor units and the Traitor player chooses the retreat area for Imperial units).

Retreating units may not enter a Destroyed Area, an area in which the stacking limit would be exceeded, or an area that contains one or more enemy units (including enemy units that are face down). If some units cannot retreat to any adjacent area because they do not meet the above conditions, those units are destroyed.

It is possible that, after a combat, a unit retreats into an area that is subsequently attacked in the same Combat Phase. If this happens, the unit that has already retreated has a defence factor of zero for the purposes of resolving combat in that area, and it will be destroyed if it is forced to retreat a second time.

Face-Down Units

A face-down unit must be turned face up if an enemy unit is in the same area at the start of any Combat Phase. It must be turned over before any combat is resolved, and the effects of any Trap, Horror or Ambush must be resolved as soon as it is revealed. With the exception of Horus, this is the only way in which face-down units are revealed. The Traitor player may not reveal them earlier in the game.

Rerolling Dice

The Emperor, Horus, Sanguinius, Rogal Dorn, Angron and Magnus the Red have the ability to allow the dice to be rolled again whenever they take part in a combat. This ability may be used if the player controlling one of these characters is not satisfied with the result of the first roll made to resolve a combat. However, he must accept the new result, and may not use the first result if the second one is worse.

If both opponents have the ability to reroll dice in the same combat, the two abilities cancel each other out and neither side may use them.

Exception: Horus and the Emperor only lose this ability if they fight each other. They keep it whenever they fight any other opponent.

Transcriber's note: Special Rules

The source refers to the special rules ("reglas especiales") and to the traps and horrors list, but neither is included in the text layer, so they are not transcribed here.

Designer's Notes

Transcriber's note: the opening lines of the designer's notes are unreadable in the source text layer and are omitted; the legible text starts below.

I had thought of some ideas for a game based on the assault on Horus's ship while I was designing Horus Heresy. Although these ideas could not be adapted for inclusion in that game, they gave me several concepts that could be developed into a game in its own right. Warmaster is the result.

Warmaster's playing time can range from twenty minutes to half an hour, including set-up time.

Be warned that the outcome of the game can be quite unpredictable: the initial teleportation of the Imperial forces aboard the ship is crucial! (During playtesting, Andy Chambers had a knack for teleporting Sanguinius directly into the ship's engines or some other horrible dimension of the Warp, with definitive results for Sanguinius, the troops with him and the Imperial chances of victory.) Nevertheless, because the game is quick to play, it is easy to start again if things go terribly wrong for the Imperial troops from the start. Over a series of games, the blows of bad luck will even out, and the best player will be revealed.

It is best to play a series of two to four games, changing sides after each game, to work out the strategy and the best tactics for winning.

Part of the satisfaction of playing a game like Warmaster lies in developing your own "master plan". To help you in your first games, however, here are some tips that may be useful. Keep in mind that Warmaster is a game of stratagems and deception: if your opponent is able to guess your plan, you will most likely be defeated. Have fun!

Strategy: Traitor Player

To win, Horus must remain hidden for as long as possible. Resist the temptation to place him on the Bridge, the Defensive Screens or any other special area, since the Imperial player is very likely to attack these areas quickly. It is also a good idea to place some Crew units in two or three areas adjacent to Horus's, so that he can retreat to them when discovered, and use them to improve your results on the Combat Results Table and to absorb losses if he is attacked. Remember that Horus will probably be defeated if he is attacked while alone.

When the Imperial forces discover Horus, retreat him towards areas where face-down Traps and Horrors are, so that you have a good chance of eliminating the Imperial troops that pursue him and more time to bring reinforcements aboard. Do not give up: remember that the longer the game lasts, the greater your chances of victory!

Strategy: Imperial Player

At the start of the game you have an overwhelming numerical superiority, so if you manage to find Horus in the first few turns, you will probably win. Try not to waste time occupying areas such as the Bridge or the Defensive Screens when you should really be exploring the ship. Once you have located Horus, drop everything, throw all of your troops into combat with him and eliminate him.

If you fail to do this quickly, you will soon discover that your troops are dwindling rapidly while the Traitor forces increase in number. At some point you will realise that you cannot hope to defeat Horus in ordinary combat. Even so, there are a number of options you can try even if things are going completely against you, such as capturing the Defensive Screens so that your Defence Laser cannons can destroy the ship, or destroying the ship's reactor room. Do not give up: remember that there is always a chance of victory!